graduate definition

1. <administration> A person who has successfully completed a programme of study and earned the final award.

2. As an adjective, refers to post-baccalaureate status.

1. One who has received an academical or professional degree; one who has completed the prescribed course of study in any school or institution of learning.

2. A graduated cup, tube, or flask; a measuring glass used by apothecaries and chemists. See Graduated.

Origin: LL. Graduatus, p. P. Of graduare to admit to a degree, fr. L. Gradus grade. See Grade.

1. To mark with degrees; to divide into regular steps, grades, or intervals, as the scale of a thermometer, a scheme of punishment or rewards, etc.

2. To admit or elevate to a certain grade or degree; especially, in a college or university, to admit, at the close of the course, to an honorable standing defined by a diploma; as, he was graduated at Yale College.

3. To prepare gradually; to arrange, temper, or modify by degrees or to a certain degree; to determine the degrees of; as, to graduate the heat of an oven. "Dyers advance and graduate their colours with salts." (Browne)

4. <chemistry> To bring to a certain degree of consistency, by evaporation, as a fluid. Graduating engine, a dividing engine. See Dividing engine, under Dividing.

Origin: Cf. F. Graduer. See Graduate, Grade.

1. To pass by degrees; to change gradually; to shade off; as, sandstone which graduates into gneiss; carnelian sometimes graduates into quartz.

2. <ornithology, zoology> To taper, as the tail of certain birds.

3. To take a degree in a college or university; to become a graduate; to receive a diploma. "He graduated at Oxford." (Latham) "He was brought to their bar and asked where he had graduated." (Macaulay)